The present invention relates to an automatic telephone answering apparatus.
Conventionally, automatic telephone answering apparatuses have magnetic tape as message recording means. An incoming message recording tape and an outgoing message prerecorded tape are alternately or simultaneously used to playback a prerecorded outgoing message to a caller and/or to record an incoming message on the incoming message recording tape for a subscriber. The present inventor has previously developed an apparatus in which a unit for generating a Morse signal is used in place of the outgoing message tape so as to deliver the Morse signal instead of an outgoing message prerecorded on the tape. The above apparatus is granted as U.S. Pat. No. 4,058,679. Along with the development of electronic techniques, an IC such as a CMOS-IC has been made commercially available which has a very low current consumption in the standby mode. Therefore, it is possible to carry an automatic telephone answering apparatus and a compact tape recorder connected thereto together in a user's pocket. Furthermore, telephone line connections are modified and simplified such that a modular plug is inserted in a corresponding jack. If a user wishes to use the automatic telephone answering apparatus having the compact tape recorder connected thereto in, for example, a hotel room during a trip, he can use the apparatus with dry cells without using an AC outlet. However, in the conventional apparatus using the incoming message recording tape and the outgoing message prerecorded tape, current consumption is large. Therefore, it is not appropriate to market a portable apparatus of the conventional type since the required capacity of the dry cells is large.